The top two U.S. Navy officials say that the forthcoming unmanned aircraft eyed for service on an aircraft carrier in 2018 must be capable of operating in hostile airspace, which means the aircraft design must feature low-observable traits. They also say they want an aircraft and command-and-control system that can be integrated into the carrier air wing rather than creating a separate system for data than exists today.
HOUSTON — The success of NASA’s future human exploration plans, as well as their spin-off potential, depends on a more strategically focused and resourced life and physical sciences research program, according to a new National Research Council (NRC) report. The April 5 report, one of a series of decadal surveys prepared for NASA by the NRC, concludes that the scale and scope of both research arenas have slipped in response to shifting agency priorities and increased competition for funds.
U.S. Air Force Secretary Michael Donley says the service is “not there yet” in declaring that the Combat Search and Rescue and Common Vertical-Lift Support Program (CVLSP) helicopters will be commercial derivatives. As senior Air Force officials firm up acquisition strategies for the two efforts, they are trying to find the “sweet spot” between an off-the-shelf option and the service’s requirements. “It is not all about cost [and] it is not all about requirements,” Donley told reporters at a Defense Writers’ Group breakfast in Washington April 5.
Even if Congress manages to pass the fiscal 2011 budget this week, U.S. military leaders and analysts say the continuing resolutions that have kept the Department of Defense afloat for much of the past year have already done serious and possibly permanent damage to their modernization programs.
COST CUTTING: Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) is praising House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) proposal to cut $4 trillion from the federal deficit over a decade — which largely spares Pentagon weapon programs (See story p. 3) — but has his own idea for reining in the runaway costs of military gear. “When you develop a weapon system in the future, this should be a fixed-price contract, not a cost-plus contract, and the contractor should have 25 percent cost sharing in the development cost,” Graham says.
HOUSTON — The U.S., Russian and Italian crewmembers of the International Space Station came within an hour of taking shelter in their docked Soyuz TMA-20 “lifeboat” spacecraft on April 5 as debris from China’s January 2007 anti-satellite test passed within 3 mi. of the orbiting science laboratory.
Pentagon weapons programs win big in a pair of budget proposals floated by Republicans on Capitol Hill, escaping sweeping cuts applied to much of the federal government to curtail the deficit. House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.) rolled out a proposal that would fund the Defense Department for the rest of the year along lines previously approved by the House and put the rest of the government on another stop-gap spending bill for one week.
A heavy-lift version of the Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) Falcon 9 could enter the launch services marketplace in the next few years, offering commercial and government customers the long-sought $1,000 price to send a pound of payload to low Earth orbit (LEO).
NEW DELHI — After years of hesitancy, India is likely to take up with the newly elected Myanmar government the issue of increasing incidents of poachers sneaking in from the Southeast Asian country. “Poachers from Myanmar have set up hideouts in India’s remote Andaman and Nicobar islands and are increasingly preying on the fragile marine ecology,” says a senior naval officer of the archipelago.
IRAN AIR: U.S. lawmakers are looking at using aviation business ties to continue to try to squeeze Iran. House Foreign Affairs Chairman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) and Rep. Brad Sherman (Calif.), the ranking Democrat on the panel, are calling on the Obama administration to withhold pending licenses for the inspection and repair of 15 U.S.-made engines on Iranian aircraft until the regime there abandons its nuclear weapons program and support for terrorism. “There is no reason we should be helping the Iranians keep these planes in the air,” Sherman says.
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Pratt & Whitney has updated progress on a four-point plan to help Lockheed Martin correct issues with the F-35B short take-off and vertical landing (Stovl) variant, development of which has been placed “on probation” by Pentagon leadership.
WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne (PWR) is poised to complete development of the RS-68A, the most powerful hydrogen-fueled engine ever made, and this week will deliver the third flight test engine for integration into a Delta IV launch vehicle. “We’re just wrapping up 68A and held a design certification review in California with United Launch Alliance and the National Reconnaissance Office on March 31,” says PWR President Jim Maser. “We’ve built and tested the first three flight engines, we’ve delivered two.”
The U.S. Navy is through with making new molds for its warships and is looking for more production-line stability from its shipyards, according to Michael Petters, president and CEO of Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII), the newly minted spin-off of the former Northrop Grumman shipbuilding units. “We’re entering a period now — and this could be most of the decade — where there’s not a whole lot of lead shipbuilding going on,” Petters said April 4 at a press briefing on the new company’s operations. “It’s a different mindset.”
Huntington Ingalls Industries (HII) will keep its ship composites construction facility in Gulfport, La., as part of its spin-off from Northrop Grumman, even as the company prepares to close its yard in Avondale, La., HII CEO and President Michael Petters says. No other facility can produce composite ship structures similar to the Gulfport facility, he says, and the company is banking that the U.S. Navy will continue to use composites in its vessels.
ARMY Alliant Techsystems Inc., Plymouth, Minn., was awarded on March 24 a $65,807,670 cost-plus-fixed-fee contract. The award will provide for the engineering and manufacturing development of the Counter Defilade Target Engagement System. The work will be performed in Plymouth, with an estimated completion date of Sept. 30, 2013. One bid was solicited with one bid received. The U.S. Army Contracting Command, Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md., is the contracting activity (W91CRB-11-C-0024).
LONDON — The European Commission is asking for industry input into how to structure its new research funding mechanism, which aims to harmonize and simplify processes. The European research commissioner, Marie Geoghegan-Quinn, has issued a green paper for public consultation to help shape the common strategic framework (CSF) that will supplant the traditional Framework Program starting in 2014.
The U.S. branch of Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. (SSTL) is expanding its online marketing operation to include entire satellites, with prices, technical details and sales information available at the click of a mouse in what is apparently a first for the satellite industry. Under the new arrangement, announced April 4, U.S. customers can order satellite buses online ranging from the $10 million SSTL-100 to the SSTL-600 at $36 million (with a deposit of $1.8 million required).
Space shuttle managers will delay launch of the space shuttle Endeavour for 10 days this month to avoid a conflict with a planned launch of a Russian Progress cargo carrier to the International Space Station. Originally set for April 19, the launch of Endeavour on the STS-134 mission now shifts to a window that opens at 3:47 p.m. EDT on April 29.
NEW DELHI — India and Saudi Arabia are enhancing their strategic partnership to improve defense ties. The two countries are also sketching out plans to conduct joint naval and military exercises to increase maritime cooperation and sharpen their defensive and offensive capabilities, a top diplomatic source tells Aviation Week.
LONDON — The U.K. agency critically linked to arms sales may be unable to meet export licensing demands, particularly as the government puts more emphasis on promoting such deals, a U.K. parliamentary report warns.
RAIDER: Aurora Flight Sciences is to design and build the composite airframes for Sikorsky’s two S-97 X2 Raider light tactical helicopter prototypes, which are scheduled to fly in 2014. Sikorsky is proposing the high-speed, coaxial-rotor Raider for the U.S. Army’s Armed Aerial Scout requirement to replace the OH-58D Kiowa Warrior, and is building two prototypes using company and supplier independent research and development funds.
